Observations and inanities by a second-shift assistant supervisor in the Puppy-Grinding division of the Evil Atheist Conspiracy® (our motto: "Sure it's cruel, but think of the jobs!"), your host, Brent Rasmussen.
Sam Harris Interview
Sam Harris was interviewed today on Day to Day (An NPR program). If you missed it, you listen Here.
If you have read "The End of Faith" then you've pretty much heard what he has to say. The difference is that Day to Day is a mid-day program aired nationally (not all affliates carry it however). Many more people heard Sam than have read his books.
I also got the sense that Madeline Brand, the interviewer, was a bit uncomfortable doing the interview.
Listen and tell me what you think.
ARB
Bookmark/Search this post with:
What do you think about this?
I'm curious about your thoughts on this: http://www.randi.org/jr/2006-09/092206bad.html#i8
Wow.
Sam Harris is soooooo very clear and forceful. I'm in awe of the guy.
I think the interviewer may have simply been unprepared to think about the subject. Not that she hated it, or hadn't read his first book, but maybe just that the conceptual meat of the thing was so new to her it didn't really stick well in her head.
Regardless, Harris shot another arrow into the heart of the automatic acceptance of religion.
In darker moments, I think we're all falling into a nasty pit of a goddy society.
In lighter moments, I see all the current religious controversies as the final flare-up of religion's fire. The thing is going out forcefully, but it's still dying.
To live in a time when Sam Harris, Richard Dawkins, Daniel Dennett, etc., are getting mainstream media attention -- and turning people's minds around -- is wonderfully exciting.
When you get right down to it, religion these days is nothing more than an extremely tenacious fad. If you get people actually thinking about it, I think it can be replaced.
And ... I think it will be. I think it is continuing to lose its power over people, and I think that will accelerate in the near future.
Science continues to replace the miracles, humanistic morality replaces the pseudo-morals of religionists, and reason replaces the fuzzy-minded mystical thinking.
When you compare the two, religion-thinking and reason-thinking, one of them is life-affirming and empowering, the other is maladaptive and dangerous. Just on the subject of contraceptives and condoms alone, religious thinking so obviously kills people. There MUST be a selective pressure in that -- toward gradually greater social reasonability.
At some certain moment, you'd expect a tipping point that would accelerate the greater social change. We may be living in that tipping point right now.
Bullseye
Well stated. You hit the bullseye with this comment. A guy going down for third time is going to drown, but he will take you with him if you are not careful.
We need Sam Harris, et al, to draw attention to irrational thinking, to make it ok to confront religious lunacy, but we also need for the less articulate among us to challenge that lunacy in our daily lives. I do not go looking for a fight but I no longer allow ridiculous claims to go unchallenged out of respect for religion or fear of hurting someone's feelings. The religious have gotten away with too much, too long.
We also need UTI, et al, to recharge our batteries, reload our arguements, and laugh-out-loud for a few minutes every day.